DE 196 32 376 A1 discloses a corner station for two separately driven transport devices that meet each other at an angle of about 15° to 175°, where the one transport belt in the transfer region with its deflection roller connects to the other transport belt guided past. The deflection device of the first transport belt in the transfer region extends or is integrated into the second transport belt, where the deflection device is provided, for example, as a deflection roller, wheel or skid. A sliding member is in the transfer region attached to the second transport device and is on its under side towards the first transport device adapted to the course of the belt. The sliding member comprises a narrow or no transfer rail towards the first transport device. If bottles are transferred from the second transport belt to the first transport belt, then a guide rail is provided which transfers the bottles onto the first transport belt. If, however, bottles are transferred from the first transport belt to the second transport belt, then no guide rail is required.
DE 25 08 275 A1 discloses a rectangular arrangement at the same level of single or multi-lane apron conveyors, where the apron belts of the delivery conveyor on their deflection wheels are at the joint of the two conveyors extended to underneath the upper belt of the outer feed apron belt and into a lateral recess of the feed conveyor and the gap at the joint of the two conveyors is bridged by a slide tongue that is narrow relative to the bottle diameters. A rail guides the bottles arriving on the feed conveyor against the gap of the two conveyors bridged by the slide tongue.
EP 0 722 896 B1 discloses a deflection device for transferring articles between conveyors that are aligned transversely. A transfer mechanism is positioned between the upstream and the downstream conveyor, where this mechanism comprises two guide rails extending across the surfaces of the upstream and the downstream conveyor carrying the articles, and a transfer assist conveyor for transferring conveyed articles across the gap between the upstream and downstream conveyor. The transfer assist conveyor is disposed alongside and parallel to the upstream conveyor and moves in the same direction as the latter. The surface of the transfer assist conveyor carrying the articles is coplanar with the surface of the upstream and the downstream conveyor carrying the articles. On the side of the transfer assist conveyor facing the downstream conveyor, so-called attachments can be attached comprising a side plate and an upper plate with a flat upper surface. The underside of an attachment is curved so that the space to be overcome between the upstream and the downstream conveyor can be minimized. Since the transfer assist conveyor runs with the upstream conveyor, the transfer assist conveyor automatically vacates itself at the end of a conveying passage.
These devices can enable good transfer of articles from a first to a second transversely disposed conveyor and prevent any halting during transfer from the first to the second conveyor belt, so that manually vacating the transfer area is not necessary.
However, jamming can occur even with a co-traveling transfer assist conveyor on the feed side when processing sticky PET containers and thereby lead to production down times. Moreover, the curve radius of a guide rail of such a co-traveling transfer assist conveyor is relatively small, so that increased wear of the guide rail can occur.